Creating a Family Cookbook

Now that I am starting to feel settled in somewhat after our move last August it's time to take another look at some of those projects I've had packed away for a while.

For instance...that family cookbook idea I had.

Several years ago (more than I can remember) I thought it would be a great idea to begin collecting recipes from the members of my mom's side of the family. They are all amazing cooks and our family dinners were always delicious!

So I began by mailing a letter to everyone: aunts, uncles and cousins. I have a fairly large family on my mom's side so I was hoping for a big response. I didn't actually hear back from all of them, but the ones that did respond sent some really great recipes and since then a few more have trickled in.

I looked into different ways to put a family cookbook together. There are several ways to do that, but my budget was non-existent and it was a rather small project in comparison to other cookbooks.

Well, it was until I decided to do it scrapbook style. Then it became a much bigger project, of course, and very time consuming. But I was determined!

The first step was to type up the recipes on the computer, then print them out in a nice *handwritten* font on card stock and finally scrapbook each page. I started buying up all kinds of stickers to decorate the pages and really had fun getting started. I have over a dozen pages done... not that many, I know.

My project got put on hold after a move in 2006 and then continued to be on hold through a few more crazy years of transition. However, now that the dust has settled I am ready to begin again! I am really looking forward to starting this again. It's so much fun reading through these family recipes from my grandma, mom, aunts and cousins. They are a true heritage and I so want to share them with my children.

So here's to re-starting a project!

Do you have any projects that you've put on hold indefinitely? Are you ready to finish them?

The Making of an Egyptian Death Mask

We are learning all about the ancient world this year with Story of the World I and loving it! We've been learning a lot about Egypt, of course, which is completely fascinating. Most recently we have studied the New Kingdom of Egypt, which includes the story of King Tut. So we decided making an Egyptian death mask in the style of King Tut's would be a fun project. First since it was too cold at the time to paper mache in the garage (it probably would have frozen instead of dried-ha) and it was too messy to do it in the house, we decided to pick up a couple of cheap craft masks at Hobby Lobby. Next we cut out cardboard shapes to complete the shape of the death mask, attaching them with hot glue. Vince even put a little detail on the *beard* with the hot glue per The Princess' request. Then the kiddos started to paint them with this metallic gold tempera paint. It worked okay for the cardboard, but would not coat the plastic of the mask. We thought maybe a second coat ...

Door Hanger Chore Charts

My kids have had a chore chart for a while. It's one of those magnetic boards and they share it. However, it's not by their rooms and often they (and I) forget to update it. Plus it's a little bulky. When I saw the concept of a door hanger chore chart on Pinterest, I loved it! It was compact, right there were the kiddos could see it coming out and going into their rooms, and it costs almost nothing to make. I headed over to one of my favorite stores: Hobby Lobby, of course. They have these little wooden door hangers for .79. I also grabbed a couple of packets of decorative buttons for $1.99 each. I already had the clothes pins and the paint so those cost me nothing. I began by painting the door hangers (I used tempera paints because that's what I had). Then I grabbed a fine point Sharpie and the clothes pins and started writing chores on them, making sure to write them correctly so they will ...

Making Notebooks

Recently I tried out a new craft idea~and it was SO much fun!! And extremely frugal, too. That's always a bonus, right? So here we go: 1. Take your basic composition notebook (purchased at the back-to-school sales for .99 each). 2. Go to your craft supplies and get your Mod Podge ready, along with a good paintbrush. 3. Look through all those scrapbook papers you've been randomly collecting and choose some. 3. After choosing your paper for the cover of your book and trimming it to fit, start *painting* the cover with the glue. Next, give the back of your paper a good coat of glue, too. (I left the binding uncovered so that I could use a contrasting paper there later on). 4. Glue it on! Remember to smooth out any air bubbles under the paper. 5. Flip the cover open and make a few cuts on the corners so that they will fold over nice and neat, then add a little more glue to the edges of the inside cover and a little more to the paper edges. 6. Fold them over and press...

my blessed life

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